The infamous triangle

While I have plenty of topics that I still want to write about, one simple one is actually already displayed in the background image! Notice the triangle? Well, actually there is also a triangle as a symbolic representation of a teaching process.

I think it's not so well known around the world, but at the university that I studied at it was used....almost everywhere for a basic of didactic methods. The reason for this is simple indeed: the main person who developed that "triangle", had been a professor there: Wolfgang Sünkel, who showed in his book (Phänomenologie des Unterrichts) in 1996 the thought process to create this triangle as well as giving several different variations.



If there are other ones who also made such kind of theory or similar concepts, let me know, since I don't know!

Anyway, while I wouldn't say that kind of theoretical construction is the best, and neither good for real practical usage, it can give a general idea about the complexities and relationships during learning processes.

What this triangle wants to show, is that for every learning process, there are three "edges" that are always there, no matter what the learning is about. The edges of the triangle are the following:

The teacher: Like the name says this is a person, or several, that teaches someone about something. (And unlike the term, this doesn't mean just school teachers, but a role that is applied in a learning process. I just don't know a better English term for that) He, the teacher, is the one who asks "what can I do for the student to successfully learn about the object?" "How can i make my kid remember the way to school?" "'How can i teach my kitten about the value of life?" Those questions already leads to the second edge.

The object: Unlike the name implies, this doesn't need to be a physical object. It can as well be a method of doing something in a specific order, the understanding of a theory, how to make ice cream, or whatever. The object however, usually doesn't ask any questions (would be odd if it did, I guess). It is simply what the student wants to learn. And this already shows the most important point, the top of the triangle.

The student: No matter if one or more students, this is the entity that needs to be interested into the object, to actually trigger the learning process. So the student is the one who says: "wow, soccer is cool, teach me the rules!" "Show me how you've built that house, I want to be able to built one too!" It should be clear now, that the students wants to "assimilate" the object, making it a part of himself that he can later use by himself without the need of help.

So now that you know the basic parts of the triangle, let's show some more how they are related:
Basically, an object can be just anything. But on the other hand, there are still limits. Can you learn a cat, for example? Sure you can watch the cute kitten hiding in a box, but that doesn't mean that now the kitten is a part of you. That's something that's impossible, because, well, how do you want a living kitten to be a part of yourself? Unless maybe if you eat the poor kitten (....oh my, please please, no!). A cat is another living being, in this case with fur and claws and fluffiness. So what you can learn or assimilate is not the cat (unless you are a borg or know fusion like Son Goku, maybe), but the knowledge ABOUT the cat, or about the cats behavior, so you can use that knowledge when going along with other cats. Shortly said, in this case, the cat is the medium for the knowledge about the cat, which is the object.

But how can the student learn about the object he wants to assimilate? While some objects, like study books can be object and teacher at the same time, usually the teacher steps in, completing that triangle.

- At this point I already had a long and tiresome discussion with a teacher, because, the necessity of a teacher in some way or other somehow disagrees with the idea of autodidacts, at least in my opinion. After all, there are learning processes that happen with trial and error, with no one telling you on what to do. But I guess the trial and error would be the teacher then. Or, you are teacher and student combined, which also would make the triangle somehow crumble. -

So let's just assume that there actually is another person that is your teacher on, let's say, how to cook. How can the teacher present the object "cooking", so that you easily put it into your own pool of "yeah I can do that, now and forever"? For this, the teacher has to connect with the initial trigger, the interest of the student for the object. Because of that, there are new lines inside the triangle, which in the end, can create the lesson.


Now, the student is mainly interested in the object, and secondary the teachings that the teacher can give, to be able to assimilate the object. The teacher is interested mainly in the lesson, which means the teaching about the object for the student to learn it, and preferably, also in the object. The object however is lazy again, and shouldn't have any interests, unless it's a precious companion cube. If it is the case and the object is in fact a companion cube, I would urge you to disregard its advice.

The process is completed, when the student successfully learned all there is to learn, and, at least theoretically, could turn into a teacher for that topic too. So if a young person shows an old one how to use a smartphone, that old person can later show and teach it to his friends.

There are many varieties of the triangle depending of the student, teacher, object, as well as their quantities and qualities and relationships, but I hope I gave you a good insight on the basic idea. Which sadly, still is rather useless if you actually have to teach something to someone. Even if it's just teaching someone how to get up in the morning in order to get to work on time. The problem that this concept leaves out, is what to do  to actually give the lesson successfully, and what to do


if you have to teach someone who's not interested, because without that interest, the triangle won't even be created, at least that's the way how i see it.

But hey, with that triangle, you can at least try and make plans for the learning processes! I think the most important thing this triangle can teach is the following: You don't teach someone for the sake of teaching, but because you want the student to reach his or her goal of learning, and to be able to successfully take use of the gained knowledge. It should be all about the student, not the teacher. But in a sense, the teacher is a student too, learning with the experience about teaching. But this would already be another triangle, with the "teaching the student" as an object.

So, maybe, in the end, it's more like a circle in which the object is passed around, giving everyone the chance to learn what they wish to learn?